Air conditioning apparatus



Oct. 17, 1944. c. H HILL I AIR CONDITIONING APPARATUS File d March 2,1942 4 sheets-sne k 1 30) (Q (Q cam-1Q 0 '10) ATTORNEY Oct. 17, 1944. c.H. HILL AIR CONDITIONING APPARATUS Filed March 2, 1942 4 Sheets-Sheet 2will. I||| \rIFII .Lrl

llll I l l l l |||||.I|| l llI-Illlll LlLlllllllll INVENTOR C1. was/ fH/LL.

ATTORNEY Oct. 17, 1944.. c. H. HILL AIR CONDITIONING APPARATUS FiledMarch 2, 1942 4 Sheets-Sheet 3 INVENTOR C L v05 H M1. 4

1 IJII |||||1|| llll llllllll i ii% ii if ||II|||||I lllllllllllll I l ll l Ill. hoeoooooooooodoooooooi ATTORNEY Patented Oct. 17, 19442,360,343 AIR CONDITIONING APPARATUS Clyde H. Hill, Portland, reg.,assignor to Hill System Inc., Portland, 0reg., a corporation of OregonApplication March 2, 1942, Serial No. 432,975

7 Claims.

This invention relates to air conditioning of rooms, where the optimumtemperature is known and it is desirable that it be uniform throughoutthe room. It involves special construction of room walls and airdistributing auxiliaries; the word room being employed in its broadestsense to mean any sort of chamber for any use within the scope of theinvention.

The principal object of the invention is to attain even temperaturethroughout the entire space enclosed by the walls of the room and toattain that optimum result without creation of perceptible air currentscommonly called drafts.

Another object is the provision of relatively rapid renewal of the aircontents of a room, without impairment of the first stated object.

Another object incidental to operation of the device and apparatus tobedescribed, is the beneficial result of better oxygen conditions due to amaintained super-atmosphere pressure.

The foregoing and other objects that will be apparent to those skilledin air conditioning and related arts, will be at once seen andconstitute the purpose of this invention.

The principle of operation may be stated in a few words. Cool air movingas a mass downward from the top encounters two or more masses of warmair moving in laterally, and if des rable from the bottom; and it mustbe remembered that these masses of warm air tend strongly to curveupwardly due to their temperature, which tendency is equally andoppositely met by the downward mass of cool air. By moving a,thermometer from place to place, or positioning a considerable number ofthem at difierent points in the room, it is easily possible bycontrolling the top and side air inlet openings, to shortly achieve thefirst stated object. Once having attained that with a given amount ofair inlet and for a predetermined temperature, very little change isfound if the amount of air and/or temperature is changed considerably.The same is true if the air pressure within the room is raised orlowered by manipulating the final outlet or vent, provided always thatsome super-atmosphere pressure is maintained.

To illustrate what I consider the best form of the invention, I haveshown a room equipped with the special devices of the invention and itwill be considered to be a brooder for the purpose of the description,since that is an important use; though it could likewise well beconsidered as an incubator, or as an operating room in a surgery, whichis another important use.

The drawings are to be considered as a part hereof and consist of thefollowing views:

Fig. I is a vertical section of the structure shown in Fig. II, taken onthe line I--I;

Fig. II is a section of Fig. I taken on the line 11-11;

Fig. III is a section taken on the line IIIIII, Fig. I;

Fig. IV is a section taken on the line IV- -IV, Fig. I;

Fig. V is a section taken on the line VV, Fig. I;

Fig. VI is a section taken on the line VI-VI, Fig. I;

Fig. VII is a front elevation, partly sectioned at VII-VII, Fig. III;and

Fig. VIII is a right hand side elevation of Fig. VII partly in section.See line VIII-VIII, Fig. III.

In the drawings, representation of the difierent structural andmechanical elements is largely diagrammatic. Commencing with Fig. I. Afan I delivers cool air to a delivery nozzle 2, and dampers 3 and 4 areadjustably positioned to deliver part of the output into a box 6,covered with a perforated plate I, and over a plurality of heatingelements such as 5; from whence the warmed .air passes into thehorizontal distribution chamber 8 and thence upwardly through the hollowside-wall spaces 9 (see Fig. II) from whence the controlled openingsill, of which there will be sufiicient number with proper distribution,fulfill the function previously described.

Returning to the delivery nozzle 2, a selected portion of the cool airis deflected upwardly past the damper 4 to a vertical duct l I, to thehollow top space l2 above the ceiling I3. The ceiling I3 is furnishedwith a plurality of downwardly projecting controlled openings I4 toproduce a mass movement of cool air within the room as hereinbeforedescribed.

The structure described, or its equivalent, will be a room within whicha mass of slow moving cool air descends from the ceiling and masses ofwarm air move inwardly from the side walls normal to the movement of thecool air. The warm air tends to thermal movement upwardly, While thecool air has a strong tendency downward.

It is the purpose of the various control means to so proportion therelative quantities of air delivered in the different directions thatthe upward tendency of the warm air is counterbalanced by the downwardtendency of the cool air. It has been found that once the regulatingmeans are set, the actual balance is not upset over quite a wide rangeof temperature variation.

Air cannot of course enter a room without a substantially equal amountleaving it and the slow moving mass of mixed warm and cool air movesdownwardly and spent air will pass outwardly to the balancing chamber[6, see Figs. IV, VII and VIII, and be finally exhausted to atmospherethrough the vent H which will be suitably controlled by a slide valve,damper or other equivalent means.

The slides shown are diagrammatic and for this reason have not beendesignated by reference numerals as the art needs none to understandwhat they are for.

Approximate realization of the same results obtainable with thestructure hereinbefore described in considerable detail can be obtainedby staggering cool and warm air inlets over the whole air admittingsurfaces of walls and ceiling, but obviously this will add materially tothe cost of construction without commensurate gain; however, I do notwish to exclude this construction from my claims, so long assuperatmosphere pressure is maintained in the air conditioned chamber,the balancing chamber is employed and the amount of air circulatingthrough the chamber is controlled by the outlet through a balancingchamber. The usual insulation of the outside walls will be used in allcases.

Having described my invention, illustrated its general structure andexplained the principle of operation so that those skilled in the artmay make full use of it, what I claim as new and desire to secure byLetters Patent, is;

1. Temperature controlling devices for an enclosure comprising, a doublewalled room, a single source of air delivery connected to the spacesbetween the walls and ceiling, means for controllably dividing airdelivery from said source into a plurality of streams, means for heatingone or more of the streams for delivery to the vertical side wallspaces, said side walls being provided with groups of spaced openingsconnecting to the enclosure, independent means for varying the capacityof the groups of openings, another air stream from said air sourceconnected to the ceiling space the inner member of which is providedwith groups of spaced openings, independent damper means for controllingthe air capacity of said groups, the said double walled room beingprovided with a plurality of spaced vents near the bottom thereof, abalancing chamber beneath the room into which said vents discharge and acontrolled outlet for said balancing chamber.

2. Air supply and conditioning means for a room comprising plenumchambers above and adjacent at least two opposite side walls thereof,said chambers being substantially coextensive with the respective roomboundaries. communication means between the plenum chambers and therooms comprising distributed groups of short ducts therebetween,independent throttling means for said groups of ducts, air supply meanscomprising warm air supply for the side Walls and cool air for theCeiling area,

a plenum balancing chamber in communication with the bottom of the room,a vent therefor and a, throttling means for said vent.

3. A heating and ventilating system for a room comprising groups ofincoming air delivery means for delivering spaced jets of warm and coolair through walls and top, thereof in streams normal to each otherrespectively, means for independently controlling groups of incoming airdelivery means, means for supplying warm air and cool air to therespective delivery means at the same pressure, a balancing chamber nearthe bottom of the room and in communication therewith at a plurality ofspaced points, an outlet for said balancing chamber and throttling meansfor controlling said outlet.

4. A heating and ventilating system for a room comprising groups of airinlet means in the ceiling and at least two opposite vertical walls,independently operable capacity control means associated with saidgroups, means for supplying air under pressure to said groups of airinlet means, comprising a heated air supply means and a cool air supplymeans, for the vertical wall and ceiling inlet means respectively, anoutlet for the room near the bottom thereof and means for maintainingsuper-atmosphere pressure within the room comprising throttling meansfor said outlet.

5. A heating and ventilating system for a room comprising heated andnormal temperature air supply means for delivering air at the samesuper-atmosphere pressure, duct means for conducting the normaltemperature air to the top of the room, spaced groups of air inlet meansin the top of the room, duct means for delivering heated air to sides ofthe room, spaced groups of heated air inlet means in said sides,independent throttling means for controlling the said groups of inlets,a balancing chamber beneath the room, spaced plural communication meansbetween the room and balancing chamber and a damper controlled outletmeans for the balancing chamber.

6. In a heating and ventilating system for a room, spaced groups of airinlet means therefor, comprising groups of warm air and cool air inletmeans in Walls and ceiling of the room respectively, means forindependently controlling the flow capacities of said groups of airinlet means, means for supplying warm and cool air under the samepressure to the respective groups, a bottom outlet means for said room,a balancing chamber interposed in said outlet means and a throttle forsaid outlet.

'7. A heating and ventilating system for a room comprising a doublewalled room, the ceiling and at least two opposite inner vertical wallsbeing provided with perforations in spaced groups, independent dampermeans for varying the air flow capacity of said perforations, means forsupplying cool and warm air to the ceiling and vertical inletsrespectively at the same pressure, a balancing chamber near the bottomof the room that is in communication therewith at a plurality of spacedpoints, an outlet duct means for said balancing chamber and means forcontrolling the total amount of air admitted to the room comprising athrottle for said outlet duct.

CLYDE H. HILL.

